Double or Nothing

We all dream of winning the lotto jackpot, or even just a few hundred thousand. But imagine winning twice! One lucky man in South Africa did just that. We expect a rag to riches story in most cases but in this case the twice lucky winner of the South African Lottery was a successful businessman from Limpopo Province. The 34-year-old, who has chosen to remain anonymous, won his first jackpot of R11 million in 2002. A mere seven years later, in 2009, he went on to win a whopping R30 million in the Powerball’s inaugural jackpot prize. The odds of the same person winning both lotteries are positively galactic, but somehow he did just that. Statistics show that he beat odds of 14 million to one to scoop his first jackpot prize, and a whopping 24 million to one to claim the second. However, he is not the record holder, that title goes to a man from Idaho, USA, who has won the lottery three times!

Despite these two big wins, the 34-year-old seems to have kept his wits about him and remains startlingly humble. After winning the first time he stated that he only spent about R100 per month on lotto tickets. Upon winning the second time, a larger R30 million, he politely declined the offer for a car to pick him up, preferring to drive himself to the Gidani offices in Midrand to claim his prize. Perhaps because of his background in business, this lucky man is still riding on the success of his two lotto wins and has said that he knows how precarious his situation is; the temptation to spend the vast amounts of money and announce to the world that you’ve made it big is positively overwhelming.

With his first win, he chose to use the money to stabilize his business and secure his assets. Upon winning a second time, he remained as level-headed as ever and stated that he would like to invest a large portion into the future of his four children and then venture into property development, which had shown to be a consistently strong sector. With the property development, he hopes to simultaneously be able to address the plight of the many homeless people in our South Africa. And whilst the details remain unclear, one thing is certain, this man and his children surely have a successful and bright future in store.